Paging system for your TV remote

[Matt] brought together a TV remote and cordless phone to add a locator system to the remote control. One of the best features of a cordless phone is the pager button on the base. When you press it the handset beeps until found. Matt gutted one and got rid of the unnecessary parts. He then cracked open his TV remote housing and inserted the telephone handset’s circuit board, speaker, and battery. The base station is used just like normal to locate the phone/remote combo, and has been modified with a charging cable to top-off the telephone battery which powers everything in the newly hacked unit. [Matt’s] demonstration video is embedded after the break.

It’s too bad that he got rid of the microphone. It would be interesting to take calls on this thing.

iv been doing this for years. but i didint use a coardless phone (overkill anyone?) i had a key pager that beeps by the press of a button on the base station (you can have upto 6 pagers too) and it runs off of 3v coin cell so i didint even need to make a charging circuit, just wire it upto the original battery connectors of the remote

I don’t think “Phone in remote” is an interesting idea because the odds you will have a cell phone in your pocket or immediately nearby are extremely high. I don’t see the advantage. But then again, I haven’t had a landline phone in years.

my mom bought me these little key chain beeper things … it came in a pack of 6 i put one on my remote once on my keys and one in my wallet and when you press a button on the base station the one that you press beeps

problem was it used a high pitch peso so it was hard to tell the difference between the beep and an echo

The first TV my wife and I bought togerther (circa 1995) was a Zenith that had that feature built into the remote. There was a “Locate Remote” button on the TV. It helped us on more than a few occasions.

@Dr. Tongue
They already have existing add-ons for the iPhone that do just that. Unfortunately, since it mounts to the bottom of phone in the charge/data port, you have to hold the phone backwards to use it.

@Dr. Tongue
I remember using remote control software some time ago on Palm and Windows Mobile phones. Considering that the IR comms port went the way of the dinosaur in favor of Bluetooth, maybe a Bluetooth-IR adapter would be the way to go for such a project.